


Can The Lonely Take The Place Of You?

by Angel Ascending (angel_in_ink)



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Crying, Depression, M/M, Pining, Spoilers Through Episode 154, there's a lot of feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-24
Updated: 2019-09-24
Packaged: 2020-10-27 16:47:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20763653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angel_in_ink/pseuds/Angel%20Ascending
Summary: What could he say to Jon? That he loves him? What would that change?It would change everything,a small part of him says, that quiet, hopeful part of himself that he shouldn’t listen to.





	Can The Lonely Take The Place Of You?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Dathen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dathen/gifts).

> Went from never having listened to The Magnus Archives to being *completely* caught up in less than a month, so this was kind of inevitable really. First time writing for this fandom and it's mostly @dathen's fault. As usual, it is the best blame.

Martin stares at the closed door, listening as Jon’s footsteps fade away, Jon’s words to him still ringing in his ears.

“I’ll be here if you need me. Just don’t wait too long. If you—haven’t already.”

Is it anger that rises up in his throat, or tears? All Martin had ever _done _was wait. Wait and hope and worry, all while offering a cup of tea, and Jon had never noticed. That was irony, wasn’t it? Jon, who was Seeing more and more every day, hadn’t seen what had been going on right under his nose for so long. Now he comes to him, _now_ when Martin is—when he can’t—

“He just needed me as an excuse,” Martin says out loud. “He knew I wouldn’t go along with his crazy—stupid— awful plan.”

Had he though? There had been something in Jon’s voice when he had told Martin that they could leave together. _Together._ There had been a light there in his eyes, and maybe it had just been the fervor of a hungry and exhausted man. But that light had gone out when Martin had rebuffed him, sputtering and dying like the last ember of a campfire, and oh, the sadness that had replaced it.

“Was just using me,” Martin mumbles, wrenching his gaze away from the door at last and staring at his desk instead. The tape recorder is still there, still on, tape spooling from one end of the cassette to another. They appeared and disappeared like cats these days, or maybe more like ravens, harbingers of tragedy to come.

“Please stop,” Martin tells the machine, and when he looks away and looks back, it’s gone.

Martin sighs and buries his head in his hands, closing his eyes. He remembers when talking to people hadn’t been so _exhausting_, when he had been able to go relax with a cup of tea and a good book for an hour or so and then return to the world with a smile on his face for those around him. And now? Now the cups of tea seem to grow cold more quickly, and the stories he had once loved are just words laying dead on the page. He could chalk it up to grief about his mother’s passing, (and relief, don’t forget relief, not just because her suffering had ended but because yours had too. Don’t forget guilt for feeling that relief.) or blame it on the Lonely’s influence, but really it’s _everything._

Martin doesn’t dream anymore, and oh he is thankful of that, even if it makes waking up more disorientating. One moment he’s slumped over his desk with his head in his hands, the next he’s waking up with a crick in his neck and his back, the paperwork he’d been working on having made a very poor pillow and his desk chair a terrible bed. He grimaces as he straightens up and looks at the clock on the wall. Three in the morning. Too late to go home really, and too early to be working. He remembers reading something ages ago about how most people in hospital die at three in the morning for some reason. Was there something to that, or was it just one of those weird urban legends that got passed around? Not everything frightening thing had to be true, did it?

Martin rubs at his face and sighs. He’s tired still, of course he is, his mind wandering. He winces as he gets up from his desk, thinking he’s too young to feel this old. His office has a couch, perfect for napping on. He’ll get a few more hours sleep and everything will be— well, everything will probably be just the same in the morning, but he’ll have had a few more hours sleep and that’s something. He wonders if Jon is at home, asleep, or if he doesn’t leave the Institute much these days as well—

The image that comes to him, sudden and unbidden, makes Martin gasp and reach out to steady himself on his desk. Jon, sitting in his office, the light from his desk lamp reflecting off the twin streams of blood that flow from the hollow pits where his eyes had been as he stares at—

Martin shakes his head. “It’s not real,” he says out loud. He doesn’t See things. Even when Martin reads statements all that comes to him are echoes of the fear that the statement givers had felt at the time of the events, and even that is probably just his own natural empathy coming into play. What he’s imagining right now isn’t real, isn’t true, he’s just tired and his mind is going places he doesn’t want it to go. That’s all. That’s all it is. And yet he’s out the door and heading down the hallways that lead to Jon’s office, only pausing when his hand meets the cool metal of the doorknob.

Jon isn’t in there. Martin can feel that before he even tries the handle. It’s locked, of course, but it doesn’t matter. The room is empty. He knows that in a way he can’t describe. Empty rooms, empty halls, places where people usually are but aren’t now all seem to echo in his awareness at this late hour. Or maybe he just knows Jon better than that. If he was still here, if he couldn’t sleep, or if he had— well. There’d only be one place for him to be, wouldn’t there?

The archives are kept on the cool side to help preserve the paper of the older statements, and Martin shivers as he walks between the shelves and filling cabinets. There shouldn’t be any sounds except for his footsteps and the gentle hum of the air conditioning, but he swears he can hear a quiet rustling, like the gentle sleepy ruffle of birds wings, the sound of the statements whispering to each other in the almost dark. There’s a light in the back of the archives and Martin walks towards it, heart beating much too fast as he walks quickly around the last row of filling cabinets, Jon’s name already forming on his lips.

There is a desk, but Jon isn’t sitting at it, isn’t weeping bloody tears, and even though Martin had been _sure_ that Jon wouldn’t have done such a thing the relief is so strong that it leaves Martin shaking, his knees weak. Instead, Jon is curled up on a cot, a thin blanket half kicked off and trailing on the floor. He looks so pale in the weak light of the desk lamp, and Martin can’t help but think of visiting Jon in the hospital, how he had looked like— well, a corpse. How he hadn’t been breathing, how his heart hadn’t been beating, even as the monitor that had indicated brain activity had been alive with colors and flashes like the most beautiful and terrible of storms.

Martin reaches down and picks up the blanket, repositioning it over Jon’s sleeping form. Now that he’s closer he can see that Jon’s shivering even though he’s sweating, as if he has a fever. Martin reaches out to place his hand against Jon’s forehead before pausing and taking a step back, his hand going to his side. No. No touching. No speaking. It’s easier this way. Even this is too much. Jon is fine— no. Jon isn’t fine but he’s not blind and Martin should go back to his office with a cup of tea that will go cold in his hands and try to get some sleep himself.

He has just enough time to register the all too familiar click of the tape recorder before Jon’s eyes open, staring straight into his.

Silence.

“Hello?” Jon’s voice is soft, sleep still clinging to the vowels. “Is anyone there?”

Oh.

“Martin?”

The way Jon says his name, so quietly, so hopefully. Martin has to put a hand over his mouth to keep from responding, feeling tears sliding over his knuckles.

Jon sits up and squints at where Martin is standing and he feels a pressure surrounding him for a moment, like what a mouse might feel like when an owl spots him in a field at night. Then Jon makes a sound of pain and his hand rubs at his eye as if he has a headache before he lays back down.

“Just— just a dream I guess.”

Martin can almost see Jon’s loneliness laced in those words, sparkling like shed tears and dust. His hand falls away from his face, his mouth opens— then closes again. What could he say to Jon? That he loves him? What would that change?

_It would change everything,_ a small part of him says, that quiet, hopeful part of himself that he shouldn’t listen to.

Could he destroy the big picture just for the possible connection he might gain from that confession? Would it be worth the few days or weeks or years of happiness before The Extinction emerged? No. No, his own happiness is not worth _that_ much. It never has been.

Martin waits until Jon closes his eyes, until the tape recorder clicks off before heading back upstairs to his own office, the thought of tea drowned out by the exhaustion that threatens to claim him again. He barely makes it to the couch, his eyes closing even as he fumbles off his shoes. He doesn’t realize he’s still crying until he lays down, but he’s too tired to do anything but let the tears fall.

“Goodnight, Jon,” Martin whispers into the dark, far away from the danger of having them be heard by the person they’re meant for. “Sleep well.”

He feels his own loneliness settle around him, almost tangible, like a blanket or a pair of arms holding him close, and then he’s asleep once more, falling into black, welcoming dreamlessness.

The click of a tape recorder shutting off doesn’t wake him.

**Author's Note:**

> The title is from the song The Lonely by Christina Perri, because I would inevitably find myself humming it whenever The Lonely came up during an episode because that's how my mind works.
> 
> I'm angel-ascending on Tumblr and angel_in_ink on Twitter if y'all want to stop by and say hi!


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